Masaki's Pride
by encapsulating.the.universe
Summary: The Kurosaki's are struggling to move on with the death of Masaki, especially when the children's ability to see spirits is only further strengthened. Things seem pretty bleak, until Ichigo decides he has some big shoes to fill, and takes up the mantle of taking care of his family.


**A/N:**

Just something I thought of while browsing the Bleach section. I find it hilarious to imagine Ichigo spoiling his little sisters at home, and beating up gangs with a spatula on a regular basis.

 **Summary:**

After Masaki's death, the Kurosaki family finds itself scrambling to pick up the pieces and glue them back together. Yuzu and Karin never make it to Kindergarten on time anymore. Isshin is unable to function as a human being, and the dishes are beginning to pile up. Their sun is gone, and without her to center all of them, they spin around aimlessly, lost in space. So Ichigo decides that they can't live off of takeout and convenience store bentos anymore. If mom wasn't there to do the things she usually would, then Ichigo would do it for her. (And guess who Best Mom award goes to?) Masaki would be proud.

So basically a MotherHen!Ichigo fic with a smatter of Don't Touch My Kitchen! and Fear the Spatula.

This will probably consist of mostly drabbles, not quite sure about where this is going yet.

 **Disclaimer:**

I'm pretty lazy with this kind of stuff, so I'll probably only be putting this up once. Bleach and any related works and franchises do not belong to me, and are the property of Kubo Tite. Period. The end. End of story. Zip. Nada. Nyet. There. Done. Don't sue me.

(Honestly, I've never really seen the point of these disclaimers. I mean, shouldn't it be pretty obvious that the things we write about don't belong to any fanfiction writers? I mean, it's even in the name. FANfiction, folks. Not "I'mtryingtomakemoneyoffofsomeoneelse'sworksfiction." Yeesh.)

But if that is happening, then that's a big nono. So don't take credit for someone else's work! Okay yeah I'm done with this whole spiel. You can rest assured you won't hear anything else from me. On with the show!

* * *

~ July 24th, 1994 ~

It was a hot summer night in Karakura, Japan. In the Kurosaki residence, our young protagonist Ichigo lay awake in his bed, sheets thrown haphazardly to the floor.

"What's happened to this family?" he thought.

Ichigo clutched his pillow to himself tightly, tears welling up in his eyes. It had already been a month since his mother's death, and it had already become clear that this family could not function without her.

Ichigo looked up at the ceiling, tears streaming down his face. "Kaa-san... What are we gonna do?" He sighed, dejected when no answer came to him. He had hoped, that when his mother died that he could find her spirit and apologize to her, but after two weeks of sitting by the riverbank, he realized that his mother's spirit had not deigned to stay on the mortal plane.

"I hope wherever you are, you're happy Mom."

Guilt settled heavy on his chest, and Ichigo cringed when he thought about how sad his mom would be if she saw them like this. The twins were too young to understand what had happened to their mother, only that she had left to "be with the angels in heaven".

What bothered him most was that Isshin seemed to be having a mental breakdown. He would spend long hours staring at pictures of his late wife's smiling visage, eyes unable to tear themselves away from the deceased woman, immortalized only in the still photos. In fact, it seemed he had time for nothing else. Every task that was attempted outside of mourning was done halfheartedly, and in a rush. Yuzu and Karin arrived late to Kindergarten most days, and socks were often different colours.

Ichigo found that the twins relied on him as a brother more than ever now. Tea parties were now a weekly occurrence to him, no thanks to Yuzu's persistence in dragging Karin and Ichigo to drink apple juice with an assortment of stuffed animals. Ichigo didn't have the heart to refuse when Karin commented that "Yuzu-chan and Momma always had tea parties together."

And before he realized it, it was common for him to hear his door crack open late into the night, and the light pattering of footsteps before two small bodied wormed their way into his bed.

As he lay pondering with his arms behind his head, he heard the all too familiar creak of the door hinges and the line of soft yellow light that shined through.

"Nii-chan? You awake?" came Karin's tentative voice. Ichigo sat up on his bed, checking the red numbers displayed on the digital clock atop his bedside table.

23:47. It was late. Ichigo sat up and and walked over to the door, flicking on the light switch as he pulled the door further open.

"What's wrong?" he said, as he looked down at his dark haired sister. His brow furrowed when she tugged insistently on his hand.

"Yuzu-chan's havin' a bad dream. She says she wants Mama."

Ichigo's heart gave a sharp pang, and a pained look crossed his features. He smiled softly. "Yeah, okay. Let's go see Yuzu-chan, ne?"

The pair quickly went across the hall to the bedroom that Yuzu and Karin shared. The door was already open, and when he peered inside, Ichigo could see their bunk bed in the glow of their Hello Kitty nightlight. He sat gently on the bottom bunk, where a despondent Yuzu was huddled in her blankets, sniffling and gripping her stuffed panda. Ichigo opened his arms, and Yuzu speedily settled herself into his lap, and relaxed when he enveloped her in a hug. Hoping to console her sister, Karin plopped down beside her as well, and offered her own companion, a stuffed turtle lovingly dubbed Kame-chan. Yuzu returned the kind gesture with a shaky smile, and gave one last sniff, tears having long ebbed away.

So far, no one had broken the comfortable silence, until Yuzu commented morosely to her siblings, "I wish Mommy was here. Then everything would be better."

Ichigo stilled. How was he supposed to respond to that? However it seemed Yuzu hadn't been looking for one, as she continued on.

"I wish she was still here. Because Daddy doesn't do my hair right, and I don't get flower shaped carrots in my bento anymore, and, and - " she broke off with a sob. "I just want Mommy to come back."

All three siblings at this point had piled together, and Karin was trying her hardest not to cry as she buried her face into Ichigo's pajama shirt.

"Mom can't come back, remember?" Ichigo whispered. "She's in heaven now, with the nice obaa-san who gave us persimmons, and the jii-chan that came to dad's clinic."

"I know," she said with a frown. "But I just _wish_ that she would come back, you know?"

Ichigo sighed. "I know, I know."

Karin, who seemed to have a better grasp on why their mother was gone, spoke after remaining silent for so long.

"Ichi-nii?" she said tentatively.

"Yes?"

"Can... can you make onigiri the way Mom always made it for us? With the birdy faces?"

Ichigo hesitated to reply.

"Please?" Karin said, making eye contact.

"... Alright." he said. "We can have it for breakfast, okay?"

"Un. Thanks, Ichi-nii."

"Now go to sleep, or you won't be able to wake up for school on time, okay?"

"Okay!" came two bright replies. Karin nimbly climbed up the ladder to the top bunk, where she slept.

"Goodnight onii-chan!" "Goodnight Ichi-nii."

Ichigo yawned from the doorway. "Goodnight Yuzu. Goodnight Karin. Sleep tight." He closed the door behind him, leaving about an inch of space. Sleepily traversing the hallway, he made it to his room and settled into bed, quick to fall asleep.

Across the hall, Isshin sat crouched against the wall, face in his hands.

"Aah, Masaki. What would you think of me now? I can't even take care of our children properly." He smiled bittersweetly. "Our son is growing up so fast." He stood up and made his way downstairs. He checked the cupboards, and winced when he saw that they were noticeably bare of any rice.

 _'Welp, better head to the 24 hour convenience store.'_

He slipped on his shoes and grabbed his wallet.

 _'I wonder if they have child sized aprons?'_

* * *

 **Notes:**

Okay, so I haven't really given much thought towards the plot for this story, but I know it will mostly consist of short chapters since I'm terrible at writing more than 10k at a time. There most likely won't be any pairings, but I'm open to suggestions. However, if Ichigo is paired up with someone, it will stay in the background and probably only mentioned. This fic isn't going to be romanced centred, so just giving you guys a heads up.

Also, don't have a beta, probably need one but wouldn't know what to do with one so... Yeah.

Random tidbits mentioned in this chapter:

Ichigo's mom died on June 17th, so July 24th would be around 5 weeks after her death. Other than that, the date really has no significance.

Hello kitty nightlight - So these kids I babysit have the cutest night lights installed in their house, and I just really wanted to add that in. I mean, Yuzu and. Karin are 4/5 at this point in the timeline, and I just thought it would be a nice thing to add in.

birdy onigiri/flower shaped carrots - I went through a phase where I insisted on making the super cute lunch boxes for my brother and sister, and I researched a bunch of ways to make Japanese themed bento.


End file.
